Oh my damn. It’s been so long since I last posted here I had to read my previous post just to memorize where I left.

The last post’s map doesn’t contain the last moments of that session in order to protect my backside in the very unlikely case I actually have someone reading this blog actively. I moved east where the trail ends and logged out on the southwest slope of Veresnik. Next time I was playing I had some friends online so I decided to head south to meet up with them.

We agreed to meet up in Nadezhdino so I quickly ran south across the fields, passed Rogovo from the west side and through Pogorevka. I then took a turn to left, heading southeast and moved towards Pulkovo.

My intention was to check any potential loot spots on my way so I wasn’t moving very fast. From Pulkovo I moved southeast to intercept the forest trail leading to Nadezhdino and followed it all the way to the village.

As I was making my way south my friends were moving north and then west from Elektro. They weren’t in a hurry either so I decided to check the farm south of Nadezhdino. While I was goofing around I get a message on voice comms that one of my friends got shot in the face and died. I decide to try and help the one surviving and ask for more accurate directions while I head east where I knew my friends were approaching from.

Regardless of asking directions many time I get none and the surviving friend ends up dead also. I notice my TeamSpeak has made a booboo and stopped voice activation, no matter what noise I make. No wonder I got no directions, they hadn’t heard anything from me for the past ten minutes or so. FML. After fixing the TS I head south where the respawned friends were.

I stop being too careful when I move in order to save time and meet up with the friends. I decide to check the farm northwest of Vysota and rush in mindlessly. Nothing valuable there so I make a decision to move on to the hill between Vysota and Cherno to maintain an overwatch of the city while my friends gather some basic loot there.

Not constantly scanning my surroundings cost me my life as I exited the barn. I hadn’t heard anything and up until this day I don’t know where the hostile survivor was, I just know I was shot from a point blank range and that quickly put me out of my misery. Great. All friends dead and gearless I decide to rage quit and try another day.

I spawned on the small peninsula south west of Cherno and checked the single house there. Can’t quite remember what exactly I found but I’ll wrap up my possessions later on. From the house I headed north and checked the fuel station across the road. At this point I had found a nice supply of soda cans but only one can of food and no hunting knife so I knew I’d have to keep an eye out for food. I thought I’d go check the Balota air strip civilian hangars and the control tower, but when I approached it I heard shots from that directio and decided it’s time to see what the north holds for me.

I turned north, crossed the Balota – Vysota road and turned northwest towards the Windy Mountain. I navigated along the eastern side of a small ravine and then turned west across the road and into the open to get a visual on the first deer stand. Only zombies were visible and they were just spawning so I knew I’m alone at the deer stand and I could zoom across the open field and check the loot. The deer stand had an AKM and plenty of mags so I was now pumping some serious heat! A short distance north through the forest while keeping my eyes open for tents I checked the other deer stand but it had nothing worth mentioning.

I knew I couldn’t sustain myself in the wild so I decided I’d try to check civilian buildings more. A barn somewhat north from the deer stand looked like a logical choice, so a short tactical detour later I was lying flat on the barn floor. Still no food and not even drinks, just inferior weapons and crap.

I had never been to the Green Mountai so I decided I’d check it from a distance, so I exited the barn to north along a small electric line and then turned westish towards the Green Mountain. I knew the place was dangerous so I didn’t want to go to the complex on the mountain, instead I circled around along the northern edge of the forest patch and checked the three deer stands as I moved more westwards. I did a small poke towards the complex on top of the mountain, but never got close enough to check if there’s zombies already spawned or if there’s someone waiting for me. Anyway, I thought I’d check the barn with a major loot spot north of Zelenogorsk in case it would have food and also for the possible bus spawn. No luck with the food, but no incidents either, I evade the zombies and exit the barn directly to west across the pond and into the forest.

I next head to north and the possible pickup spawn southwest of Sosnovka but still no luck. I haven’t seen a single vehicle spawn since I started playing this game so I wonder if I’m just not looking hard enough. My food indicator is starting to be more and more orange so I’m in a kind of hurry to find something to eat. I have already consumed the only can of food I had so I’m walking on very thin ice here. I check the minor loot spots in Sosnovka but find nothing so I head north to the farm which has a fuel tank.

The barn is once again a lost bet and I’m now very close to starvation. It’s time to forget all carefulness and just rush for the food spawns. I exit the barn to the northwest and navigate across the forest patch until I reach the road on the north end of the small forest patch. From there I run across the road pretty much straight north, circle around the Pustoshka buildings and rush into the grocery store. Strangely I manage to avoid all zombies so I can loot the store in peace.

The store has some much wanted food so I eat one can and grab whatever I can. I still haven’t found a bigger backpack so it’s a tight fit to keep all the necessary stuff with me. While I’m in the town I decide to visit the church and light a candle for the fallen. The church yields a pleasant surprise when I finally find a map and a G17 with some spare ammo! I say my prayers and exit the town to the east.

I’m gonna split this adventure in half to keep it in a reasonable length, the rest of it will follow in the next post.

I spawn in the west end of the coast and decide to go hunting. North through the forest is a ok-ish loot run with three deer stands, a small shack and a barn with major loot. I find nothing worth mentioning in the first two deer stands but the third one contains and AKM with some spare ammo so I grab it. Still low on basic survival gear I decide to head north east and check the close-by barn. I can see the far edge of the forest from the deer stand so I take a rough heading and sneak across the open field and into the forest.

I exit the forest right where I planned and track a short length of the forest edge to the north until turning east and crossing the Komarovo – Pavlovo road. As I approach the road and prepare to cross it I keep observing my surroundings, especially to the south as there’s a building next to the crossing and it started spawning zombies around it. No incidents with the zombies so I cross the road and approach the barn somewhat carelessly but manage to avoid zombie detection.

When I’m next to the road north of the barn I hit the dirt as there’s a couple of zombies close by. I try to be as sneaky as I can to avoid the zombies so I crawl to the barn doors. I hear footsteps from inside the barn and a survivor pops into the door opening. He’s carrying a crossbow and before my fumbling fingers find the push-to-talk button I get a bolt through my sternum. I go into a shock and fall unconscious before I can react, the survivor shuffles around aggroing a zombie and then withdraws to south through the barn. As the aggroing zombies loses line of sight on the survivor it turns it’s rage on my sorry unconscious ass and the last thing I see on the screen is an hourglass and a zombie eating my face. That didn’t end quite like I planned it.

Take two

I respawn on the coast roughly on the same spot as last time, so I decide to try the same route again. So north through the forest and check the three deer stands. The deer stands are even more in vain than last time but this time I find the first sniper rifle I’ve seen in the game ever. The third deer stand holds a CZ550 but unfortunately no ammo. I decide to grab it anyway as I don’t have binocs and I think I can substitute the binocs with the scope for a while as I try to find some ammo for the gun.

Once again I head north east to the farm but find nothing useful there. From the farm I head somewhat east as I decided to check the Balota air strip control tower for loot. One thing I haven’t mentioned earlier is that everywhere I go I try to check the open fields for helicopter crash sites. I have never seen one but I know they spawn in the open when the server restarts so I keep my eyes open on them. I did some research and some of the results suggest the crash sites don’t spawn very close to the coast but then again it won’t hurt to keep your eyes open, right?

Anyway, I head east through the fields north of Komarovo and approach the air strip. I haven’t heard any gun fire or seen aggroing zombies so I enter the air strip perimeter through a hole in the fence next to the control tower and check it for loot. Still no ammo for the gun and nothing else worth mentioning. As I work my way down the tower I try to practice moving as carefully as possible, leaning around corners to see there without fully exposing my bulk to a possible hostile aiming back at me, same with the stairs and walking slowly on hard surfaces to keep the noise down.

I’m on the last turn in the stairs on my way down when a survivor suddenly jumps out from under the stairs. I turn my gun away to show I mean no harm and try to find the PTT again but then the bastard shoots me in the face once or twice. I start bleeding and shout through the voice comms that I don’t have ammo and mean no harm, while I bandage myself to stop the bleeding. This doesn’t stop him so I end up taking my last breath on the control tower staircase lying on the floor in a pool of my own blood.

Now, this dying is starting to annoy me. I’ve died a number of times without actually achieving anything or finding anything nice so I need to change my play style radically or just keep hoping I’d finally run into some less trigger happy players. Let’s see how this evolves. The first run is shown on the map in red, the second one is pretty much the same up until the barn and continues there in blue.

The following takes place during multiple sessions and doesn’t include all the fooling around on private hive servers and custom maps while bugging on the public hive.

I spawned on the coast south of the Drakan port and immediately checked the possible loot. Didn’t find much, not even a hatchet. As I crawled my way out of the port I noticed another survivor right next to me, walking slowly and trying to avoid the zombies. I engaged in voice comms and he turned out to be fellow finn with equally bad gear. He aggroed two zombies so I told him to follow me to the nearby industrial hall. No hatchet there either, so we waited the zombies to lose interest on us.

The guy wanted to go on his way so I climbed the hill north to check the western face of it overlooking Elektro as it is a known sniper spot for the pro snipers shooting fish in the barrel. Nothing there except for an empty tent and some shots in the distance so I decide to leg it to the fire station. Nothing there and I’m starting to get thirsty so I think it’s time to screw the caution and just rush to the grocery.

I find some general gear, binocs and food and a crossbow with a single dart, woohoo. No room for a tent though, dunno if it would be any good anyway. A quick dash across the street to the south and I enter a bar. I aggroed a zombie or two on my way there but they quickly lose interest in me as they no longer see me. I head upstairs and find some a bigger backpack there. As I check the loot I start hearing shots from the outside. Not sure if it’s a fire fight or someone trying to keep the zombies at a distance. I check out the window and see a survivor in the grocery, checking the very same loot I checked just moments ago. I decide to wait until he leaves and then head to the second fire station.

A quick dash through the city and I enter the fire station with no incidents and carefully climb the tower. I find no better weapon and some survival gear but just as I’m done I hear aggravated zombies outside. Do they see through windows that high or is there someone down there coming for the tower loot? I go to the lowest elevated floor on the tower and hear foot steps. Definitely a survivor. As I try to decide whether or not I should try communicating through voice he darts up the stairs. I quickly aim away from him and lean left and right to show him I’m friendly. So much for being nice, regardless of me trying to show no bad intent I get a warm greeting along with shotgun pellets and die on the floor in a puddle of my own blood. Should’ve just shot him when I saw the bandit head-wrap but too late for second thoughts. Death 6.

Bugs All Over The Place

I end my session to the death screen and log out. On the next session I decide it’s time to stop being cautious and just run for the initial loot. But not so fast, mister! As I connect to the server and wait my time past the loading screens I get the UI icons and notice the shock indicator. Wth? Am I not dead after all? As I gain my vision I notice I’m not in the fire station tower anymore but on some beach like a fresh spawn. Next thing I know I fall unconscious and start bleeding. Nice. I wait for the hourglass indicator to progress but nothing happens. I’m gonna bleed to death. No, wait, the bleeding stops. The hourglass still shows no progress and as the UI has been unresponsive for some time now I decide to alt-tab to Windows and close the game. I restart the game and after loading I get the same, shock and instant uncon. But no bleeding this time.

The hourglass indicator doesn’t show any progress so I alt-tab away and quit the game. Maybe it’s the server bugging? I try on another server and get the same. Great. How am I supposed to play now? I start googling and find a lot of forum posts with the same problem but no solution, just some vague remarks about server admins being able to help. RL days go by and I don’t find a fix for the issue, although having no time to play I don’t seek very actively either. At some point I end up asking for help on the IRC and fellow survivors tell me I just have to wait some eight minutes to regain consciousness and then crawl my way to a zombie to die. Fukken ay! I give it a try and after one sudden disconnect it works but without the crawling, I finally die and when I respawn I’m as good as new.

I spawned where I left and decided I’d check the closest locations for possible vehicle spawns. I navigated through the woods to the road leading to Tulga and followed it until I reached the fields west of Tulga. I circled around the open field and approached the village from north. The zombies were spawning in so I decided I’d crawl in and see if the Škoda had respawned there. No luck and I now had all the zombies coming towards me. With nerves of steel I lied flat on my stomach behind a small fence as an armada of zombies slowly walked, crawled or hopped by. When the threat was no longer imminent I crawled out of the village and headed north towards a deer stand in the three valleys.

The deer stand didn’t offer too much, just some basic supplies. I then legged it to the barn in the next valley north and found one more clip for my revolver. I also found an Enfield and a Winchester but I decided to leave ‘em as I already had an AKM. From there I ran out to the north towards the comms tower and Solnichniy and picked up a couple of irritated zombies so I had to lose the tail before continuing.

I then headed west towards Dolina and planned to check the farm and the factory. I never got that far. As I entered the open field next to the farm I heard a shotgun go off quite near me and felt the pellets sink into my flesh. I quickly tried to shout “don’t shoot!” and scanned my surroundings, but the shots kept landing from an unknown location and after the third shot I was dead.

End of an era

I didn’t have anything really valuable but losing the survival gear pisses me off. Now it’s gathering it all before heading inlands all over again and I could’ve kept on going. I never wanted to shoot players and I always travelled with my revolver out to appear less of a threat but apparently my assailant didn’t think I should be left alive. So no more niceness in the sense of trying to appear friendly, now it’s guns out no matter what. You live and learn. Or die and learn in this case.

I reconnected next to the power line where I last left and headed inlands. I had long time ago decided that if I manage to survive long enough to get my hands on the basic survival gear I’d head inlands. Now I have everything I need to survive: water bottle, extra soda cans, bandages, a rifle and a sidearm, hunting knife, matches and a hatchet. These allow me to get food from game by slaughtering them and cooking the meat. The cooked meat also restores some of your blood so even if you get hit by zombies every now and then you should be fine.

Let’s go hunting

I had everything I need for making food except the game so it was time to go hunting while moving inlands. I found some rabbits while running around in the forest but decided to leave them alone as they’re fast and give only one piece of meat. I ran across any fields I could reasonably plot into my course on my way to Pusta and then to Staroye. I was also looking for helicopter crash sites in case I’d find some binocs, range finders, NV goggles or a better rifle. No luck though.

Finally on the outskirts of Pusta I spotted a cow or a goat in the distance grazing on the pasture northwest of the village. I approached the animal through the open and checked my surroundings for zombies and possible survivors and when I turned my eyes towards where the animal was last seen there was nothing but an empty field. What the hell? I moved closer and indeed there was no animal anywhere to be found. I ran around in the field hoping to find something else to eat when I spotted zombies spawning near the village. I guess it was my presence that made them spawn, but now I had to be more careful. Luckily I found a sheep and managed to gut it for six pieces of meat. At this point I was really hungry (food indicator flashing red) so I rushed into the woods, harvested some lumber to make a camp fire and cooked the meat. I was relatively exposed at this point but not knowing what’d happen if I let the food indicator keep flashing long enough I decided to take the risk. Nothing happened and I filled my stomach with fresh game, yummy.

Now I was truly ready to move forward so I decided to continue towards Staroye. I planned to go along the open fields and try to spot any heli crash sites and would also check all the deer stands I could find. I crossed the road between Pusta and Staroye carefully and moved uphill towards a big open field. I then approached Staroye and checked a couple of buildings there but didn’t find anything of interest. I had to shoot some of the zombies as they were becoming a bit too friendly. Can’t beat the cold shoulder, now can you

From Staroye I moved east towards Msta checking the fields and deer stands on my way. I managed to accidentally attract some unwanted zombie attention, but a couple of of 7.62mm bullets to the chest silenced the resistance and I could move on. From Msta I headed south and checked the barn in the village outskirts but didn’t find anything useful. I checked one more deer stand and an industrial loot spawn but nothing of interest came up. I’m still without binocs, range finder or NV goggles so I need to be very careful when moving in the open. Can’t scout too far ahear without binocs or range finders and moving in the night is sort of hard without the NV goggles. A bigger backpack would be nice also but I can manage with the current one. I think I’m carrying too much bandages so I might ditch some of them.

I decided it’s time to log off so I hugged a tree and disconnected. I haven’t decided yet if I’ll be going towards Kamyshovo, Tulga or three valleys. All of them have their pros and cons but I kinda need those optics so can’t be too picky. Also might join some finns later on and they might take me somewhere else than what I had planned.

The following happened during the time-span of a couple of days and consisted of multiple sessions, so this is a wrap-up of what happened. Only part of the events are depicted on the map below.

Short struggle and a recovery run

I woke up near the Balota airstrip and was in pretty bad shape. I kept loosing my consciousness every now and then, my vision was blurry, I couldn’t hear very well and so on. Everything to make surviving in a hostile environment a tad harder. It was night time so I resorted to the gamma cheat and headed to the civilian hangars. Didn’t find anything useful there and the close by medical camp was equally fruitless. At this point I decided to make a rush for the Cherno supermarket and managed to get there. Found some basic supplies but nothing to make my blood count go significantly higher.

I then moved on to the adjacent civilian building and then to the fire station. I didn’t find anything of interest so I decided I’d head towards the hospital. At some point I realized my vision stopped blurring and zombies were nowhere to be seen. That’s weird. I proceeded to the hospital, found some med supplies and moved on to check if there’d be any vehicles around. No luck. I then checked the apartment buildings in the outskirts of Cherno, the ones next to the other hospital. I managed to scavenge a watch and a revolver with some extra ammo. It was time to move on.

Red Streak

I moved north through the east side forest and followed the power lines to Vysota. My plan was to check the farm north of the power lines and see if I could get my hands on a hatchet. I arrived to the farm, vision still blurring and quickly went through the large barn. Didn’t find anything useful there. I moved on to check the adjacent cowhouse and finally I found the hatchet I had lost in Cherno. No, wait, what the heck? I had a hatchet in my backpack even though I thought I had lost it :O The entire trip here was useless. I decided to pull out of the cowhouse towards south and decide later where to go. I crawled out of the building and could hear a Z somewhere close. I tried crawling slowly, but managed to alert the zombie, so it was time to put the pedal to the metal. I sprinted out and jumped over a fence. I went past a bush and quickly threw myself on the ground to lose the zombie but no luck. The bastard got me regardless of the numerous .45 revolver shots I put into its chest. Being already low on blood it was the end for me, so back to the beginning.

Blue Streak

The next spawn was in Kamenka. Crap. It was miles to the body of my previous reincarnation. I thought I’d try to find some wheels while on my way there, but no luck. I did manage to find two dead survivors so I got some more bandages for me. I checked some of the buildings in Kamenka, but there was nothing for me, so I decided to leg it. I ran along the road and took a detour to the north to get past Komarovo without attracting zombies. I approached the Balota airstrip without hesitation, I hadn’t collected anything irreplaceable this far. I managed to find a G17 and an extra clip to it from the control tower and continued my way eastward.

From the civilian hangars I turned towards the inland and took course to intercept the power lines leading to the substation. My plan was to follow the power lines to my corpse and in general everything went as planned, just a slight detour as I took the wrong power line when almost there.

I quickly looted my corpse and dropped some junk to make more room for the necessities. I was out of food and food indicator was turning more and more red by the minute. I kept following the power lines east and took a small detour north in Kopyto to check if the helicopter was there. No luck. I kept going east along the power lines and this time I decided to leave the notorious barn alone. Instead I had decided I’d check the Pik Kozlova for the possible ATV. Still no vehicle for me

From Pik Kozlova I wen south to check the lighthouse at Cap Golova and if there would be some hidden tents. Didn’t find anything (not even the bicycle) so I headed east towards Elektro. I knew I didn’t want to go into Elektro but go around it. Sooner or later I must go into Elektro if I don’t find food elsewhere, but that’ll be another story. At the time of writing this the plan is to head inland and hope to find some game to slaughter and cook. Otherwise this will be another short incarnation for me.

Anyway, east I went and I crossed the Pusta road right where the road enters the forest. I continued east and headed towards the farm where I knew some high-end loot might pop up. Before I got there I heard someone cough and immediately hit the dirt. There it goes again! Wait, is that me coughing?I popped up the debug monitor and saw my blood drop in small fractions. Damnit, too much outside in the night, I caught cold. Luckily I had found some antibiotics from the Cherno hospital so I cured myself and went on.

Soon enough I arrived at the farm and went in. As I was rummaging around the barn I heard an engine somewhere quite close and I was sure the driver was coming to check the barn. A quick check for any valuables and a even quicker retreat into the forest. Didn’t hear the engine anymore but didn’t want to stay around in case they were onto me.

I decided it was time to log off and searched a nice location where I could hide, laid flat on my face under a conifer and disconnected. Gonna try and find some fellow finns to play with tonight, hopefully they’ll have some spare food for me.

Well, shit. I think I just fell victim to a hacker. I didn’t die but it wasn’t far. Here’s a recap of the latest session.

I respawned at Drakon and decided I’d circle via Dobryy to the Elektro fire station. I spotted a tent laid in the conifer where the snipers usually camp, but the tent had been rendered unusable because of the bug/feature when laying them into the tree branches. I advanced to the fire station and managed to grab an AKM with some ammo. I could’ve taken a Winchester instead, but I decided to not to. I also found a PDW with a couple of clips, so now I was relatively safe from zombies. While searching the fire station I heard a player walk outside but never saw anyone, so I decided to leg it and headed north along the road.

I went past the Topolka dam checking the places as I went and then headed west towards Pusta. I had no food or drinks and I was starting to get dehydrated so I needed to move fast. I reached Pusta and rushed inside one of the red bircked houses, ignoring the zombies and managed to lose them. Finally some drinks, I was safe for now. I then continued southwards until I hit the power line and then followed it west until I arrived to Prigorodky. This is where I died the Death 2 and again I met another player inside the notorious barn. He wasn’t armed, so I told him he could keep anything he can get from the adjacent cowhouse and headed north into the woods.

I continued following the power line westward via small detour to Kopyto to walk across the little dam there and shortly arrived to Vysota. The barn there has possibility to drop quality loot so I went in and dug around a while. Next thing I know I pop into an airfield with seemingly all the other players on the server. Seems like I’m in Balota. Screams about “fucking hackers” in multiple languages ensue as evasive actions are taken and guns fired in order to survive. I get hit somewhere, start bleeding but manage to switch to my AKM (I kept the PDW in my hand and the AKM on my back to appear less of a threat to anyone possibly observing me go). I then fire my first shots at a survivor who was firing at me but I’m not sure if I hit or kill him. Either way, he deserved it with his bandit outfit even when it makes me feel bad to be forced to shoot at a survivor.

Still bleeding and in shock I rush towards the control tower to get some shelter and I have to shake off a couple of zombies on the way. I hide under the stairs and bandage myself. When the bleeding stops I’m around 1800 blood with blurred vision, degraded hearing and all the fun stuff. I had collected a couple of tins earlier so I eat them trying to reduce the constant loss of consciousness. The blood is now up around 2300 and I’m scared stiff as I hear local voice chat around me, hear guns being reloaded and hasty footsteps around me.

I keep hiding under the stairs for a while, pointing my AKM at the direction of the possible assault, but then decide I can’t hide there forever. I head upstairs and find some loot on the way and a body on the floor. I hear flies so I think he’s dead. I keep looting the top of the towers and when I turn around I see a guy taking a closet look at the body. I immediately ask him not to shoot and he agrees. Suddenly the body starts to move, so he was just unconscious and his buddy came to help him. They give me morphine and I think it helps some but they can’t help me more so I decide to leave. Before I head out I give one of my spare AKM mags to one of them as a sign of gratitude and then head out into the forest.

The post visualized on a map

At this point I hear my kid wake up from her nap so it’s time for me to log off. I throw myself flat on my face under a conifer and log off with low blood and no food with me, so this may turn out to be death 3. Unfortunately there’s no way to know until I log back in so fingers crossed.

Well, this sucks. I woke up where I left and headed towards the planned barn. When I got there, I noticed two dead survivors being eaten by a zombie. I carefully approached the zombie from behind and gave his right temple a warm nickel-coated kiss. I checked my surroundings and took a closer look at the survivors. Holy camoley, they had some sweet loot! NV goggles, G17 with abundance of mags, all kinds of stuff. I went to the upstairs to check if there’s something usable when I see another player run into the barn. Shit’s about to get real.

He immediately starts checking the bodies and doesn’t mind the two zombies gnawing on his buttocks. I observe him and then he turns towards me, I don’t realize I’m holding my newly acquired G17 pointed at him and I hear a panicked scream on the voice channel. Turns out he’s a fellow finn trying to shoot a video with his friend and he was equally scared of me. We decide to stay in the barn and wait for his friend to arrive.

Soon the third guy turned up and we decided we’d head north to see if we can get me a better gun than the 1866. I certainly didn’t object getting help. While we were planning, the zombies had gathered in the barn and were wandering aimlessly. We tried to sneak past them, but I got caught and tried to get rid of the one harassing me. No luck, the zombie broke my leg, got me bleeding and unconscious. I could hear how the fellow survivors were a bit puzzled first and didn’t realize what was going on. When they did, it was too late, I was dead. I hope they looted my body as I re-spawned way across the map with no chance recovering the loot any time soon.

Local DayZ scene I spotted one day.

A screenshot from the game. Compare with the photo above.

This spawn was in Kamenka, a city had’t seen before. A quick check on the http://dayzmap.com revealed some loot spots around my area, which I checked just to get my hands on a hatchet. I headed towards the Balota airstrip and checked the game towers while on my way. I was just about to enter the civilian hangars, when I saw another survivor zoom past me without realizing I was there. He was unarmed like me so I decided I’d follow him into the hangar and try to make friends. Turned out he didn’t hear much of my voice but was able to chat locally in English. We agreed to go shopping in Chernogorsk but on the way we got desynced and I lost him. I kept going towards the supermarket and checked the red bricked house on the way. Nothing but five or so zombies which luckily left me alone.

I went into the market and heard flies. Great, a dead survivor. Wonder if I’m gonna end up like him, as I had no idea what had killed him. Found binocs and some other stuff from the front and the body, so I then headed to the back. While looting in the back I hear footsteps from the front and checking the doorway I see zombies coming in. A survivor drew them with him and he was armed. I still had my hatchet and I kept my distance while trying to tell him not to shoot me on the local voice. No luck, he knee-capped me before he realized I was harmless, so there I was on the ground, bleeding, in shock and with a broken leg. I bandaged myself but I had lost so much blood that I had trouble hearing. I managed to hear he was sorry but I guess not too sorry to stay and help, as he zoomed away. I decided to see if I can find something to help with the leg and constant unconsciousness’.

I slowly crawled towards the fire station and finally got in, after going around because of a barricaded entry. Now, this might sound silly, but I actually trird getting into the tower. Crawling up the ladder isn’t the easiest task, when you have no space in the corner to turn and you can’t walk because of a broken leg. I did manage to drag my butt to the second floor, but the third floor turned out to be too much. I fell from the stairs on my stomach, went into a shock and bled to death. A valorous end in a puddle of blood, lying flat on my face.

I think I need to stop being so careful in the beginning and just rush into some place I know to have loot. I might drag half the zombie population with me but who cares as long as they’ve got weapons and I don’t?

Whee, finally found a Winchester from some weird barn close to Vysota. Before going there I took a hit-n-run approach and went shopping in Chernogorsk and found an ALICE pack and binocs. I checked the red brick house and the supermarket, but I didn’t know there would’ve been a fire station right around the corner. Too late to go back now as I’m heading east along the coast.

I also spotted my first survivor. She was running across the fields in the open and looked unarmed. I observed her a while and looked like she was a beginner like me or then just trying to get to loot quickly, but the last time I saw her before moving on was her running near some small industrial buildings bleeding and chased by gazillion zombies. I would’ve helped her had I had a scoped rifle but unfortunately they were too far away for my 1866.

Once again camped in the forest and logged out, this time I wasn’t fully replenished so we’ll see what happens. One weird thing I noticed is that the server I usually play on seems to have a skewed loot structure, during the first two days I didn’t find much else but car parts (wheels, windscreens, jerry cans). Dunno if it’s just my luck or something real.